Mr. Rossa Mulcahy:

There is engagement with the representative associations, particularly RACO in this case. I am hopeful we will have a number of vacancies coming up at that rank, such as an assistant chief of staff and a cyber commander. The flag officer of the Naval Service is due to retire. We have a number of upcoming competitions. We will try to run a series of those boards. A number of them are open service-specific. To answer the question of the retired member, in our DFR CS4 regulation, which sets out the structure of the Defence Forces, the assistant chief of staff role is at the moment considered an Army appointment but, as Ms McCrum said, we have not yet engaged with the representative association with regard to that particular competition. We will do so, however.